PD

23 October 2009

I wrote and illustrated ‘The Good Old Kiwi Pub’. It was published in 1995 and was a snapshot of some New Zealand pubs as they were at the end of the 20th century. I have decided to share some of the entries from the book from time to time on this blog.

It’s the relief lettering on the balcony that appeals to me. I’ve seen nothing quite like it elsewhere. It is in a style known as ‘Stencil’ and is typical of the art deco period. The veranda wing, which incorporates the balcony, some decorated farmhouse shutters and support posts with strange, pyramidal bases, looks to date from about 1930 and has been added to an unremarkable nineteenth-century hotel.

As its name implies, the hotel sits beside a railway line, the one that runs the length of the Wairarapa to join, at Woodville, lines from Palmerston North and Hawke’s Bay. Over the years its relationship with the permanent way has been such that, at one time, the pub was called ‘The Office’ because the boys from the railway station tended to spend significant parts of their working days in the bar. The goodwill engendered kindliness all round and the pot belly stove in the bar was usually white-hot from the free coke dropped off from passing trains!

Woodville, a horse training and farming town, also has an important geographical raison d’etre; it guards the eastern end of the Manawatu Gorge, which separates the Ruahine and Tararua Ranges and provides easy access to Palmerston North and the west coast.

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Blurb

About Me

I was born on 20 January 1933, nine days before Hitler came to power in Germany, I grew up in south London. Although evacuated during the phoney war and the quieter times I lived in and out of air raid shelters during the blitz and experienced both V1 and V2 attacks on London. Left grammar school in 1948 aged 15 substantially undereducated. I wanted to go to art school but because of family ‘poverty’ joined a commercial art studio in the West End. I was, thereafter, variously a messenger boy, commercial artist and typographer. I was in the Royal Air Force from 1951 to 1953 when the only useful thing I did was to take part in King George VI’s funeral parade.

In 1955 I married Patricia O’Donnell, a RADA graduate, at that time playing opposite Derek Nimmo, they were juvenile leads in a touring repertory company. He went on to great success because he had a funny voice.

We came to New Zealand in 1960 where I worked in advertising. At length I became managing director of one of the companies of whose holding company (the largest domestic advertising complex in New Zealand) I was also a proprietor and shareholder. I left the industry in 1990 when my company was bought out by American interests. My timing was brilliant, at that point my first book had been published and the next was on its way.

We have two daughters and four grand-children.

Now, apart from writing, I function as a self-educated grumpy old man.

Books & Writings

‘New Zealand Odyssey’, with Euan Sarginson, Heinemann-Reed, 1989.

‘One Man’s Heart Attack’, New House, 1990. (A special edition of this book was purchased by CIBA-Geigy for distribution to NZ doctors).

‘Open 7 Days’, Random Century, October 1991.

‘The Good Old Kiwi Pub’ by Saint Publishing in 1995 followed by:‘New Zealand House & Cottage’ in 1997. (Saint Publishing have also published calendars for the years 1994 to 2004 using my watercolour illustrations).

‘The Wastings’, my first novel was published in July 1999 by Hazard Press. Although an international subject it had very limited distribution, only in New Zealand, and the rights have reverted to me. (Colin Dexter read 'The Wastings' and wrote to me: 'I enjoyed and admired "The Wastings"... a beautifully written work... a splendid debut in crime fiction... More please!'.)

Also the texts of photographic books:‘Auckland’‘Colourful New Zealand’‘New Zealand in Colour’‘Top of the South’‘Aoraki-Mt.Cook’‘Above Auckland’‘Hauraki Gulf Destinations’‘Otago’‘Bay of Plenty’and a compilation of photographs and quotations titled ‘Anzac Memories’ 2004 all published by New Holland.

My written and illustrated book, ‘Country Churches of New Zealand’ was published in October 2002 by New Holland, who also published ‘Rural New Zealand’ 2004 (photographs and text), and a series of four humorous books of photographs and quotations in 2004 and 2005 titled ‘Woolly Wisdom’, ‘Chewing the Cud’, ‘Fowl Play’, and ‘Pig Tales’. My most recent book was published in August 2006 by New Holland, titled ‘Political Animals’.

Over the years I have written for NZ Herald, Heritage Magazine, Next Magazine and various local and overseas travel and general interest media.